How to Listen to your Wife

At the heart of every relationship, you’ve just gotta have communication. The tricky part is, for both men and women, the primary purpose of communication is different.

Men talk primarily to find solutions.

Women talk primarily to explore their feelings and connect with others.

Because we communicate in such different ways, we often make HUMONGOUS mistakes that can be majorly problematic for couples.

Men think they actually have to talk and find solutions to the things women are talking to them about rather than just listening – I know, why are they thinking, they should be listening?!

Women make the mistake of trying to encourage men to talk about their feelings – er… yeah right, like that’s gonna happen. Men simply don’t feel the need to talk feelings!

The point of this article – and there is one I promise – is to give the guys a few tips on how they could improve the way they “talk” to their lady.

Why give the men tips and not the ladies? Well, we’ll give the girls tips another time but, being as talking, and talking, and talking, and talking, is SO important for keeping women happy and feeling understood, it’s gotta be on the top of the life skills guys wanna be honing!

So, here goes:-

Listen

You don’t have to talk – yep it’s really that easy!

Much of the time, women want you to simply listen, understand and empathise that they’ve had a really crappy day, this person’s got on their XXX’s or they’ve got too much on. They’re not asking you to solve any of this shizzle, they just want to get it out of their hair.

Pay Attention

Just because you’re only listening and not having to solve anything doesn’t mean you don’t need to pay attention. If you don’t pay attention, she’ll say something that really does require an answer and you’re gonna be up that creak big time. You love her. You want her to feel happy. So pay attention or pay the price.

Ask Questions

Now I know earlier we said listen and don’t talk, but women are contradictory. You’re going have to do an incy wincy bit of talking by way of asking questions. Asking questions encourages her to keep going. It proves to her you’re actively listening and interested in what she’s talking about. Ask her how she feels about what she’s talking about. What happened next, etc. Try not to make your questions too logical though. The idea is to prompt her to keep going until she’s spent.

Give Feedback

Understand and empathise by telling her that you understand how it or the situation is difficult, frustrating or upsetting for her. By doing this, you’ll be encouraging her to talk and get it off her chest. You don’t necessarily have to agree with her, just empathise and let her know you understand her hurt, frustration, irritation, etc

Don’t Multi-Task

I know we often say that men can’t multi-task, but it’s amazing how many things you can do at the same time as your wife or girlfriend is talking to you. DON’T. Don’t be tempted to do anything except listen. Forget the game, the TV, your newspaper or whatever it is that’s vying for your attention and give it all to her. If you do it well enough and often enough, her “talk” will only last 5-10 minutes and then you’ll be free to go about business as usual. The difference is, you will have left her with a feel good high – and earned yourself a few notches on her broomstick at the same time.

Listen for Coded Messages and Decode

If she’s saying “we never go out” she doesn’t actually mean “never”. Women use very flowery and emotive speech patterns. What she’s actually saying is “I feel like getting out of the house with you.” Watch out for these coded messages and try and decipher what’s really being said.

If you can master the art of listening to and communicating with your lady you’ll make your wife or your girlfriend extremely happy. She will feel understood and reassured that you care and empathise with her feelings. She needs this to feel that you love her and care about her.

Do it now before she finds some other guy that’s more willing to fulfil this care instruction on her care label.

How do you make time to listen to your lady? Why not share the knowledge in the comments so other guys CANDo it too?